


in the light of the ungentle sun

by AwayLaughing



Series: the unseen [8]
Category: Naruto
Genre: Dysfunctional Family, Emotional Baggage, Emotional/Psychological Abuse, Emotionally Repressed Vicious Old Ladies, Gen, Grandparents & Grandchildren, The Hyuuga Clan is a Tragedy
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-06-27
Updated: 2017-06-27
Packaged: 2018-11-19 14:36:22
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 803
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11315448
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AwayLaughing/pseuds/AwayLaughing
Summary: Hyuuga Tsukimi is dying, which means it's as good a time as any to have a few honest conversations.Her grandson wouldn’t be her grandson if he were here of his own volition.





	in the light of the ungentle sun

The upside to being a dying Hyūga, Tsukimi decided, was that you got to do it in the nicest private room in the palliative care ward. Kimiko had arranged for plants to be brought in, arranged so they impeded no one, but made things look a little less like a room designed for dying in. The bedding was personalized, and she spent her days sleeping and being read to, or having Kimiko keep her up to date on the world outside.

 

Not many other visitors for Hyūga Tsukimi. Hinata had been here, and spent an hour stuttering her way through an update about her new genin team before Tsukimi finally sent her away. She had a good heart. Tragically she was utterly useless – if she’d been born second they could have nurtured her kind spirit and moulded her into a wife for some favoured branch member or possibly even a noble Konoha wanted to court.

 

Better still, if she hadn’t been born at all. Or had the courtesy to die before her third birthday.

 

No, she much preferred her current visitor, for all he was only here because she’d demanded it be so. No – that was what she enjoyed. Her grandson wouldn’t be her grandson if he were here of his own volition.

 

“Obaasama,” he said, bowing as he entered. He came just inside the doorway, making no move to sit or say anything else.

 

She smiled. “Take a seat, boy,” she said. He did as he was told, sitting as stiff backed as any of his relatives, hands folded politely on his lap. Neither of them said nothing – she just studied him. He looked back, passive and still. Over the years he’d mastered it, truly. If she didn’t know him, he would be just another blank faced Hyūga in a crowd.

 

But she did know him – because she knew herself.

 

“Henshō broke three vases, the day we learned your mother was pregnant,” Tsukimi said after a long stretch of stubborn silence. “And then he screamed at Hiashi and Ume. I think it’s one of the only times I’ve seen Hiashi stand up to him,” she huffed. “Foolish boy.”

 

Neji’s face betrayed nothing, not even potential curiosity.

 

“You see, there is nothing you could do to affect his personal dislike of you,” she said. “You were always going to be another reminder of our imperfect sons. Hizashi was always the better of the two – but so much more fragile,” she fixed her eyes on his. “Your mother was good for him, on that front.”

 

“Thank you, obaasama,” he said, not flinching at the mention of all he’d lost so far.

 

She laughed – it made her ribs and lungs ache but it was very much worth it. “He died long before you were born born, but you have shades of your great grandfather in you.” She smiled wryly. “The old bastard who killed my family. I always liked him better than Henshō.”

 

“A ringing endorsement.”

 

She laughed again. “That right there,” she said. “Make no mistake, I hated Hidane-sama, but I understood him. As I understand you.”

 

“Of course, obaasama,” he said. _You don’t know me at all_ , she heard.

 

“You’re like me, boy. Trapped in our little family web, a noose around your neck for the high crime of being a discomfort,” she knew her smile must be sharper with every word, but Neji was carved marble with no apparent cracks. As it should be – but was it really? “But still you are here – you haven’t shattered like your father.”

 

His jaw finally ticked. Hizashi was a touchy subject for the boy. Yes – he had some cracks. They all did – he would get over it. The cracks wouldn’t go away, but he would learn to hide them. He would learn to hide ugly truths and exploitable weaknesses in the darkest shadows far and away from the sun they took their name for.

 

Or he wouldn’t, and he would be the one who slipped into shadows.

 

“You don’t plan on following me any time soon, do you boy?” she asked him, eyes narrowed.

 

“No obaasama,” he said. There – a slight slip of the chin. Defiant. True.

 

She reached out and pat him once, gently on the offending cheek. He was tense as a wire under her hand – face still smooth as any child’s. None of the bumps or scruff of young adulthood, though the threat lingered in his features. She would never see it – but she had seen it before. Seen the same growing cheekbones and hardening jaw in the mirrored images that had been her sons.

 

Her pitiful, doomed sons.

 

“No – you’re not your father. Nor your uncle. No you,” she smiled at him, hand tightening slightly. A grip, but not enough to hurt. “You’ve always been my favourite” she said.

 

He flinched.

**Author's Note:**

> Tsukimi once saw one of those quotes, you know, "if you found out you were dying would you be nicer? Kinder?"
> 
> The answer is a resounding _**hell nawh**_


End file.
